(written Monday, 28 July)

Yesterday we left Paris and today we met the sea. In our time this says nothing – we can cross hemispheres in half a day – but when all you have seen of France has been from the window of low cost flight or even from a TGV, a roadtrip from Île-de-France to les îles de Hyeres, gives a much better sense of scale, and what you’re missing on the way.

Leaving Paris is an annual tradition, and from the end of July to mid-August the roads are packed. One of the most popular is the “Autoroute du Soleil”, which heads southeast from Paris to Lyon on the A6, where it joins the A7 to shoot down the Rhône valley towards Marseilles. It’s one of the oldest, and most highly trafficked, French national roads, and it is infamous for its jams.

While travel on the American Interstate system can be a flavorless cycle of cloverleaves, weigh stations and Flying J truckstops, driving in France provides an excellent taste of the wealth of the countryside, and the embarrasment of riches in land and the history that comes along with it. In the US, the brown and white signs marking points of interest are few and far between. The blue and white ones marking rest stops are of course more common but less exciting. Even these, in France, have a touch of class omitted in the States.

Here, rest stops – what we Americans sometimes laughably refer to as “comfort stations” – are called “Aires de Repos”. The simplest meaning of “aire” is “area”, but I prefer the alternative definition of “aerie” – a raptor’s nest – which is more colorful. Each of these rest stops has a name, some evocative – Aire of the Doe, of the White Dog, of the Great Tower, of the Imperial Woods – but most often they are toponymic. In addition to the standard amenities, many aires have a piece of public art, of 60s, 70s or 80s vintage, presumably to valorize the parking lots, picnic tables, and turkish toilets they accompany. To me this is a typically French flourish for a public project, and it would be interesting to know the history of its conception, and the fate of the many sculptors who contributed works to such a distinguished set of galleries. From Paris to Beaune, aires crop up every 10km or so; from Beaune to Lyon, ever 15km. I’ve read that there are many “phantom aires,” closed indefinitely, whose signs remain on the roadside. I wonder what happens to the abandoned art.

Signs for points of interest, historic or otherwise, provoke an altogether different sense of delight and discovery. In the US, these are generally reserved for battlefields and natural formations, and though a similar pattern is found here, they are far more prevalent, and – thanks to the images on each – far more fun. To be sure, some are just indicative, an arrow and a name for a geographic formation – the Massif of this, the Dentelles of that, the Paysage of your current region. Others give a historic summary – Avignon, Cité des Papes, or Orange, Cité des Princes. My favorites, however, offer a handy, state-endorsed illustration of something you may, or may not, see from the car window. A crennelated tower in the distance, or a sombre chateau just by the roadside, is given a name just as you may ask what it is. It is the chateau of Bourbilly, of course, of of Egouilly. Sometimes the white-on-brown silhouettes come without prevision, and you crane your neck to find the original form over the guard rails, the fields and trees, before passing by.

Being able to identify an unknown countryside as you pass through it animates the six lane trajectory. The merit of this approach to highway travel fell on me about an hour after our depart. No sooner had I asked, “Where are we?”, than a 1.5×2 meter panneau, showing a short-horned cow flicking its tail, announced, “Land of the Charolais.” The brown cows in the fields astride the highway suddenly had a name. I knew nothing better of our longitude and latitude, but I was happy to know that those cows had an appellation, and one I already associatied with quality steak. Not much later we passed a dramatic tableau: a Gaulish soldier, bellowing beneath his moustaches, raised sword above winged helmet against his Roman foe. We were not far from the Battlefield of Alesia, where Vercingetorix made his long last stand against Caesar. Lest we forget.

I appreciate the French approach to signage on an otherwise lifeless part of modern transport infrastructure because, at a moment, it is generous, didactic, efficient and, above all, casual. It is patrinomy writ short, and in its brief indication there it implies not only that “Vous etes ici,” but you are here, and, bien sur, you should know what here means. These “points of interest” signs can pique the imagination of a history buff and illuminate the passage of everyman – and they give everyman an answer to his children’s backseat “Are we there yet?”. “No, we just passed Dijon, seat of the dukes of Burgundy,” or better yet, “No, we are only at the Crocodile Farm – look at that sign and te toi.” I am all for a reductivism that, at 130km/h, may not turn the landscape into an open book, but at least gives it good captions.